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Grinding an Iron Pestle Down to a Needle

The other day I was listening to a ChinesPod podcast and they talked about the saying “铁杵磨成针” (tiě chǔ mó chéng zhēn) [lit. iron pestle grind into needle]. Then coincidentally I found an anecdote in my “Tales and Traditions, Vol. 1”, which is kind of curious and funny. I’m going to leave you the story without translation, it’s an easy read for a low intermediate level. I underlined a few words that might be a little harder:

Wo do not have a 把, but you could say that instead we split the verb and its complement in order to indicate the direct object.

Well, I guess the 把 construction is not as easy as the 一边…一边… construction, but it’s definitely something to get used to. Let’s finish up with the last sentence:

后来，人们常常把“铁杵磨成针”用来说明一个人只要有认真，就一定能够成功，做到他想要做的事情。

I’m not a linguist, but this is not exactly the same as the first sentence we looked at, however, it can be seen with the same structure, we can think of it first in the simple construction:

人们 [subject]
“铁杵磨成针” [direct object]
用来[verb] + 说明[v. complement]

So we know that the outline of the sentence in English should be:

人们 + 用来 + “铁杵磨成针” + 说明
People use the [phrase] “Grinding an iron pestle down to a needle” to illustrate + [indirect object].

In this way we can now see that the indirect object is what is left of the sentence:

“…一个人只要有认真，就一定能够成功，做到他想要做的事情。”

If I’m not wrong in this case we have the construction:

Subject + verb + direct object + verb complement + subclause

And the translation would start:
People use the [phrase] “Grinding an iron pestle down to a needle” to illustrate that [subclause].

It seems like such a hassle to do this whole translation process, of course, that’s not what you do when you’re reading, this is to show you in detail how the construction works, how it is different from the English translation, and how to organize all the pieces. The important point of the 把 construction is that right after the 把 you will want to look for the direct object and then a verb, that is the simple construction. If the sentence is more complex you will also see either an indirect object or a subclause.

Don’t be discouraged if you are having trouble reading something, as you see it more you will get used to it’s varied uses or as the chengyu goes 熟能生巧.

This has been a long lesson, I hope you liked the little story and see you next time.